The visit began with dinner at North Slope Borough School District Superintendent Peggy Cowan's home. NSBSD Coordinator of Curriculum & Instruction Linda Frame cooked a yummy meal for us and three other NSBSD teachers in attendance! (thanks again to both of you for that!)
On Monday we spent all day in Jan Parks' 7th grade science classroom at Eben Hopson Middle School. It was a lot of fun meeting her students as Dr. Yager led them through an interactive lesson on Arctic ecosystems.
Dr. Yager leads ecosystem discussion.
Is Dr. Yager checking her watch for the time?
No, she's holding a class pet- watch out he's slippery Tish!
One of Jan Parks' classes had an added treat, a visit from Dr. Rachel Obbard and her team. I met Dr. Obbard through UIC Science/ Chief Scientist Karl Newyear who put us in contact with each other before the trip. I was looking for a sample of seawater that we could use in a classroom activity and Dr. Obbard volunteered to get it for me. She and her team (undergrad student Ellyn Golden & Grad student Ross Lieb-Lappen) are extracting ice cores from the sea ice off the coast of Barrow.
If that isn't interesting enough, HOW they are getting them back home IS! In a nutshell, they're DRIVING them home (to Dartmouth College in New Hampshire) in large "trunks" engineered to replicate the temperatures they were found in! They call them Icemitts.
Dr. Obbard brought one of them to Ms. Park's classroom, complete with an ice core! The students thought it was a casket with a body! :) Dr. Obbard and Ross gave a good presentation on their work and the engineering behind the Icemitt.
Learn more about the Icemitt and follow Dr. Obbard's expedition at https://theicemittproject.wordpress.com
Dr. Rachel Obbard, 2nd from right explains her work. On the right is Ellyn golden, 2nd from left, Ross Lieb-Lappen
Ross opens the Icemitt to show the interior and an ice core!
Ross explains the different components of the interior.
Ross and Ellyn check the Icemitts.
Learn more about the Icemitt and follow Dr. Obbard's expedition at https://theicemittproject.wordpress.com
The day ended on a high note when teacher Jan Parks agreed to work with me by doing water sampling for our SMORE (Students Monitoring Ocean Response to Eutrophication) project. Long term, Dr. Yager and I will work with her on SMORE together next school year, as well as provide her resources so that she can develop classroom units that include our project!
On Tuesday we were back at Hopson MS for a Skype call between my classroom in Houston and Carrie Imel's class. We also had 2 SMORE alumni students from Barrow High School present ! Both classes engaged in a conversation meant to give Texas students a glimpse of life in Barrow. It was a lot of fun to watch! Special thanks to Gabriella in Barrow and Devin in Texas for making it work!
Barrow students answer Texas questions.
SMORE alumni! Monika & Kim from Barrow HS joined the SKYPE call.
Next we went to Barrow High School where we visited MJ Geiser's class who are currently working on their senior capstone projects. Dr. Yager engaged them in a conversation about current ocean science topics relevant to Barrow and offered her help and resources to any student who might be interested in working on them.
Students in Barrow High School
Later in the afternoon we went to meet Alice Sage who works at the KIITA Learning Center. After explaining our student project (SMORE) she was interested in having 3 of her students work with us. They are on whaling teams and will be a really interesting addition to SMORE! More about that later!
Our last stop was Wednesday morning, just before we left for the airport.Our visit was to another Barrow HS class with Social Studies teacher Mike Price and his students.The conversation raised interesting comments and dialogue about climate change in the Arctic and its effect on Barrow.
Dr. Yager and I left Barrow with a new appreciation for the culture and its people. We are both very optimistic about the new collaborations that are possible and a renewed sense of understanding about how to make science relevant within the Inupiaq Learning Framework. The story is just beginning!
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